Page 87 - les-miserables

With this exception, he was in all things just, true, eq-
uitable, intelligent, humble and dignified, beneficent and
kindly, which is only another sort of benevolence. He was a
priest, a sage, and a man. It must be admitted, that even in
the political views with which we have just reproached him,
and which we are disposed to judge almost with severity, he
was tolerant and easy, more so, perhaps, than we who are
speaking here. The porter of the town-hall had been placed
there by the Emperor. He was an old non-commissioned of-
ficer of the old guard, a member of the Legion of Honor at
Austerlitz, as much of a Bonapartist as the eagle. This poor
fellow occasionally let slip inconsiderate remarks, which the
law then stigmatized as seditious speeches. After the im-
perial profile disappeared from the Legion of Honor, he
never dressed himself in his regimentals, as he said, so that
he should not be obliged to wear his cross. He had himself
devoutly removed the imperial effigy from the cross which
Napoleon had given him; this made a hole, and he would
not put anything in its place. ‘I will die,’ he said, ‘rather than
wear the three frogs upon my heart!’ He liked to scoff aloud
at Louis XVIII. ‘The gouty old creature in English gaiters!’
he said; ‘let him take himself off to Prussia with that queue
of his.’ He was happy to combine in the same imprecation
the two things which he most detested, Prussia and Eng-
land. He did it so often that he lost his place. There he was,
turned out of the house, with his wife and children, and
without bread. The Bishop sent for him, reproved him gen-
tly, and appointed him beadle in the cathedral.
In the course of nine years Monseigneur Bienvenu had,

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